September 16, 2008

Postgame quotables, Wade Phillips version

Here's what Cowboys head coach Wade Phillips had to say after his team hung on to beat the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday Night Football:

... Alright! What a game! What a game, what a win. I can be proud of our guys. Had a lot of things go against us in the first half, especially, I think, six penalties, 2 turnovers. Things looked bad. We make a big play right before the half and kicked a field goal. Second half, I thought our defense really came through for us. The offense certainly played well the whole game except for the turnovers, and that got us in the hole. But, the big play was the fumble, the fumble recover and then us going in for the touchdown after that and we played lights out after that.

... Donovan McNabb, anybody thinks he's too old or can't play anymore, they're absolutely wrong. The guy kept them in the game and made great plays. But Tony Romo had a heck of a game. He had over 300 yards passing ... and no sacks.

... It was just a great game! I mean, anybody that saw the game ... I guess it's greater when you end up winning. But I think it was an outstanding game, two outstanding teams and our guys came through.

On the defense: Well, the second half ... they scored seven on us in the second half. We played better as the game went along. I thought we got stronger defensively. It was hard to get to him [McNabb] alot of times. I mean, we did sack him some. And there at the end our defense kind of took over. We really played well the last two series. And that certainly put the game away.

On playing in a game with 70 points scored: It was almost 70 points in the first half. But it was just a great game. I mean, it was. It was a great game. I mean, I can't say the defenses played bad, I thought the offenses played outstanding. We had guys making plays on both sides of the field and both quarterbacks played well. I thought our protection was good. When theirs broke down, the quarterback got away from us ... I thought we kept our head in the game, kept believing in each other, the leadership of our captains really helped us as the game went along and everybody said 'Hang in there, we're going to come out on top, and we did.

On the offensive line: It's the whole group. It's everybody. The one before the half, when he stepped up and hit that one. And of course, he had the big one to Terrell in the first half that got called back. And we had a couple penalties that really hurt us. But those things we certainly gotta get cleaned up. It seemed like every penalty was against us except one in the first half ... Tony played outstanding. Our offensive line played outstanding. And our backs really picked it up.

On throwing the challenge flag on the non-touchdown: We saw it. The problem was it was an inadvertent whistle and they're going to give the ball back to them anyway. But it's better than a touchdown. They scored anyway. But it was one of those inadvertent whistles. If the guy doesn't signal a touchdown, which it wasn't, you know, we pick up the ball and we run it back. But he signals a touchdown and all our guys stop.